I love sensory bottles, and so does my 15-month-old granddaughter. And I love that sensory bottles are very adaptable for babies through preschoolers. Today, I want to share a simple tutorial for making water-bead sensory bottles in a rainbow of colors.

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links at no cost to you.

Water beads are fun for so many different types of activities, including sensory bottles. You can find them in the floral section of a craft store, at The Dollar Tree, or on Amazon.

Supplies needed:

Here are the supplies you’ll need for making water bead sensory bottles in a rainbow of primary and secondary colors

6 bottles (I just recycled some 8 oz. water bottles from a birthday party.) I especially like the 8-12 oz. size for babies’ small hands. (Of course, if you want beautiful bottles, check out the Voss water bottles.) (UPDATE 1 year later: Zoey has used these bottles SO MANY TIMES that I wish I would have used Voss bottles. The ones I have still work, but I’d love them to be in great condition for future grandkids, too!)

4. If you have a funnel with a large-enough opening, use the funnel to add water beads and water to the 6 bottles. Preschoolers can fill the bottles themselves. Toddlers can often fill the bottles, too, if they have a tray or pan underneath to catch the water beads that spill. If your funnel’s opening isn’t large enough, water beads can be put into the bottles by hand.

5. Add food coloring to any bottles you want to be a darker shade. I added food coloring to a few of the colors to create bright primary and secondary colors.

6. Seal each lid to a bottle with the hot glue gun. (I waited two days before sealing to allow time for any additional expansion of the water beads. I wanted to leave enough space at the top for the water beads and water to move easily when the bottle was tilted. When I had the amount of water beads and water I wanted, I sealed each lid.)

How to Use the Water-Bead Sensory Bottles

Rainbow Water-Bead Sensory Bottles for Babies:

A Rainbow of Water-Bead Sensory Bottles

I just like to let a baby explore the sensory bottle. What could be easier?!

Rainbow Water Bead Sensory Bottles for Toddlers and Preschoolers:

Excited to explore the water-bead sensory bottles

With a toddler, you could use the Montessori 3-period lesson to name the color when you touch one of the bottles. For young toddlers, it’s fine to stay with the first period. You mainly want your toddler to explore the sensory bottles.

Taking water-bead sensory bottles off the tray

After I said the name of each color, my granddaughter created her own activity. She loved taking the sensory bottles off the tray and putting them back on. She spent a long time with the activity, an important part of developing her ability to concentrate. I just had to be careful not to interrupt her concentration.

You could have a scavenger hunt where your toddler or preschooler brings objects from around the house to match each color of water bead sensory bottle.

Introduce the rainbow colors and ROY G BIV to your preschooler. The songs “They Might Be Giants – Roy G Biv” and “Colors Song for Children” are fun ways to introduce ROY G BIV. Have your child line up the sensory bottles in order. You can omit indigo in the lineup (unless you want to create an indigo sensory bottle, too).

Please take time to read the submissions by the other carnival participants:

DIY: Homeschooling — Have you considered homeschooling but aren’t sure how you could make it work? Kerry of City Kids Homeschooling offers some do-it-yourself encouragement in a guest post at Natural Parents Network.

Super Easy Berry Freezie — Tracy at Raised Good shows how to make healthy, delicious, dairy-free ice-cream for toddlers and their families in under 10 minutes.

How to Get Kids to Behave in Church — Becca at The Earthling’s Handbook explains how she’s been able to participate in religious activities that mean a lot to her, without being separated from her kids.

Valentine’s Slippers — A sneak peek at Life Breath Present‘s crochet process with some slippers for Hun for Valentine’s Day this year!

DIY Nursing Bra Conversion — Holly at Leaves of Lavender provides a quick tutorial for how to convert your favorite regular bra to a nursing bra.

Beginning Knitting Project for Kids: Knit a Pikachu — What do you do with all of those practice squares you knit when you are a beginner? Turn them into Pokemon! Kieran, 7-year-old son of Dionna at Code Name: Mama, brings us a video tutorial for this awesome knitting project for kids and adults.

If this is your first time visiting Living Montessori Now, welcome! If you haven’t already, please join us on our Living Montessori Now Facebook page where you’ll find a Free Printable of the Day and lots of inspiration and ideas for parenting and teaching!

Those look like fun! I like the way you explain about your granddaughter creating her own activity, which you allowed her to focus on doing as long as she wanted–that’s so important in building the brain, but it’s tempting for adults, when we’ve made something for kids and imagined them using it in a particular way, to direct them too much. Both my kids have shown a lot of interest in simply arranging objects of assorted colors, and now that my oldest is 10 I can see how that plays out both in academic abilities and in his sense of confidence about what color is “right” for a desired effect in art.

Thanks, Shecki! I’m looking forward to doing lots of fun activities with water beads once my granddaughter is beyond the mouthing stage. I’m glad we’ve found some fun activities with them in the meantime. 🙂 Deb

I’ve never even heard of water beads, but you’d better believe I’ll be picking some of these up the next time I make an order on Amazon! This is such a neat idea, and I bet my 3-year-old would love playing around with them.

I just ordered some water beads off of amazon for 3.29 and no shipping. Ten bags different colors. Want to do this with my 9 year old son becuz he is so hyper and my grndbb who is 4. I know he will really enjoy it. Thanks for the post

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The activities shared on this blog require adult supervision at all times. You know which activities are appropriate for your children and/or the children under your care and are responsible for those children's safety.